Declaration on bottom trawling on the African coast

On the sidelines of the United Nations Conference on Climate Change (COP26), the President of the African Confederation of Artisanal Fisheries Organisations (CAOPA), Mr Gaoussou GUEYE, made a statement on trawling. In this statement, he denounced the impacts of bottom trawling on African artisanal fisheries.

Read the statement! 

Mbour (Senegal), 08 November 2021

“The African coast – our home, our workplace, our food supply – is in danger.

Climate change, caused by the activities of industrialized countries, is now eroding coastal areas and washing away our homes.

Climate change is causing more storms that put our fishermen at ever greater risk.

Women fish processors are returning from the beach more often with empty baskets. The fish are getting fewer, smaller and more expensive every day.

Fish, which has always been our food safety net, is disappearing from the plate of the African consumer.

But fish are also disappearing because of overfishing and destructive fishing practices, such as bottom trawling in African coastal waters.

Scientists tell us that bottom trawling reduces the productivity of the seabed, leads to a loss of essential fish habitat and disrupts the structure and functioning of ecosystems.

Scientists tell us this, but we African artisanal fishermen see the damage of industrial bottom trawlers in our fishing areas every day.

In some African countries, we even see trawlers coming in every night to fish illegally, with their lights off, a few miles from the beaches.

Artisanal fishing communities, from Congo to Senegal, from Kenya to Madagascar, are bitterly denouncing daily collisions, sometimes fatal, with these trawlers that fish illegally in the reserved zone for artisanal fishing.

The heavy gear deployed by these boats destroys the nets of artisanal fishermen and the owners rarely agree to compensate them.

Personally, I do not know of any industrial bottom trawler that was built in a tropical African country.

All the trawlers we see in our waters come from China, Russia, Europe, and Korea. They come into our coastal waters, which are known to be rich in fish, through various arrangements with our authorities-chartering, re-flagging through joint ventures, or fishing agreements.

With some exceptions, African artisanal fishing communities that depend on fishing for their livelihoods are never consulted, or even informed, by our leaders before bringing in these boats that often do not respect the rules.

In Liberia, Spanish trawlers, re-flagged in Senegal, are plundering deep-water shrimp resources in the artisanal fishing zone, under the pretext of experimental fishing.

In Senegal, trawlers of foreign origin that are re-flagged systematically refuse to take an observer on board.

In Côte d’Ivoire, most of the national coastal trawlers are of Chinese origin, either flagged or chartered locally. These trawlers fish indiscriminately, destroy the fragile coastal environment, do not respect biological rest periods, and mistreat their crews.

The lack of respect for nature is joined by the lack of respect for human beings.

Today, our African artisanal fishing communities are fighting for their survival. Not only do we have to deal with the crisis caused by Covid 19 and the restrictions that have been put in place, but we also have to deal with the consequences on our oceans of disasters caused by human greed, whether it is overfishing, and the impacts of climate change or offshore oil exploitation.

We will survive all this, we will adapt our homes, our fishing seasons, our way of life.

In 2022, it is the International Year of Artisanal Fisheries and Aquaculture, decreed by the United Nations. This will be an opportunity for us decision-makers to show that they are fully aware of the importance of small-scale fishing for employment, food security and the maintenance of dynamic coastal communities, steeped in the culture of the people of the sea.

One of the priorities of the organization I chair, the African Confederation of Professional Organizations of Artisanal Fisheries, CAOPA, is to ask our governments for exclusive access rights to coastal zone for African artisanal fishing. In African coastal countries, this means getting all trawlers out of the coastal zone.

We also want the entire coastal zone to be managed with the fishing communities. The coastal ecosystem is our home, who better than us can keep this home in good condition, with good tools.

One such tool is participatory monitoring.

A few years ago in Guinea, fishermen detected more than 400 illegal incursions by trawlers into their fishing grounds. Twelve fishermen were injured, lost at sea or died. Surveillance patrols by artisanal fishermen in the area have reduced the number of recorded infractions by a factor of four.

Another of these tools is protected marine areas, but only if they are set up and managed by local communities, and if they are part of a dynamic of co-management of the coastal zone by fishing communities.

We no longer want fishing practices in this coastal area that destroy the fragile coastal ecosystems on which we depend for our livelihood.

An industrial bottom trawler fishing a few miles off the coast in a tropical African country is a bull in a china shop. We can no longer accept this.

Thank you”.

Look video (44 minutes:50″ )

 

Bay Mr Gaoussou GUEYE, President of the African Confederation of Artisanal fisheries Organisations (CAOPA)

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